PLEASANTON — A section of downtown around the planned civic center could get taller in the future.

Buildings there will be allowed to reach a height of 46 feet under guidelines of the Downtown Specific Plan that the City Council approved Tuesday. The plan will serve as downtown’s growth blueprint for the next 20 years.

The biggest change could come to an area dubbed the “mixed-use downtown,” which includes the current Civic Center at 200 Old Bernal Ave. and the former San Francisco Public Utilities Commission properties at 401 and 403 Bernal Ave., bought by the city in 2016. That section previously was designated for public and institutional buildings up to 40 feet tall.

The city wants to build a town square district there that would include a new city hall and other amenities such as a new police station, a community center and possibly a boutique hotel. City voters eventually would have to approve such a project.

Among critics at Tuesday’s meeting was former mayor Tom Pico, who said the Downtown Specific Plan was built on a “sand foundation” in part because it assumes city hall and the library would be relocated. “That will never happen. Not in this city, not if we need a vote of the people,” he said.

The council also was criticized by former members of a task force assembled by the city to come up with recommendations for the downtown plan. Jan Batcheller said first the planning commission and now the council were straying from the recommendations she and other task force members had made.

“To say I’m disappointed in this process is an understatement,” Batcheller said. “The process has been flawed from the beginning.”

She accused some groups in the city of spreading disingenuous innuendo and falsehoods, specifically that the task force wanted to “supersize” downtown. Such false allegation caused residents to panic and deluge the council with letters that swayed it to modify the downtown plan, she said.

For example, she said, the task force recommended a 40-foot height maximum for buildings in the downtown “mixed-use transitional” area but both the planning commission and council went with a 36-foot limit.

One of the groups Batcheller likely alluded to was Pleasanton Voters, which had been ringing the alarm that the task force’s recommendations would make downtown too tall and dense.

The plan approved Tuesday will cap buildings in the downtown commercial district at the current 40 feet. But although two-story buildings would be encouraged there, the plan allows for three stories on a case-by-case basis. The vote for that change was 3-1, with Councilwoman Karla Brown dissenting because the planning commission could approve three-story buildings without final say by the council.

The mixed-use transitional zone covers the area north of Old Bernal Avenue and east of Peters Avenue. Instead of going with a recommended height limit of 40 feet in one part and 30 feet in another for offices, the council went with a uniform 36-foot height limit, which city staff suggested would transition well with the residential area to the west.

Ground-floor residential units also prompted a discussion at Tuesday’s meeting, with the council ultimately agreeing they should be banned from most of downtown except in the transitional neighborhood, with some caveats.

As for the downtown area’s residential districts, buildings will be limited to 30 feet and two stories.

Two properties — the Shell gas station site at 4212 1st St. and Barone’s Restaurant site at 475 and 483 John St. — would have to go through a special “planned unit development” process if redeveloped for residential use, meaning they ultimately would require council approval.

City staff also suggested that Division Street between Main Street and Railroad Avenue could be converted to pedestrian-only, but Councilwoman Brown said she would be concerned about losing parking. Assistant City Manager Brian Dolan reassured her that that particular option would require a lot of study because no one wants to see less downtown parking.

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